Definition
Ownership or holding of property by a single person in that person's own right alone, without any other person being joined or connected in interest. An estate in severalty is the baseline form of individual ownership — the tenant holds exclusively, unshared, and may exclude all others from any claim to the same interest during the continuance of the estate.
The concept is defined primarily by contrast: severalty stands opposite to joint tenancy, tenancy in common, coparcenary, and any other form of co-ownership in which two or more persons hold undivided or shared interests in the same property.
Common Language
Modern common usage (Wiktionary): The sole ownership of property by someone; the quality of being several or separate.
Historical common usage (Webster's 1913): A state of separation from the rest, or from all others; a holding by individual right. Illustrated by reference to forests "which had never been owned in severalty."
The common and legal definitions are closely aligned here, but the legal use is narrower and more technical. In ordinary language, "several" can simply mean "more than two but not many," which may mislead a researcher encountering the phrase "in severalty" for the first time into reading it as referring to multiple holders rather than a single one. In law, "severalty" always signals the opposite: individual, exclusive, sole ownership.
Common Confusion
Severalty is sometimes confused with tenancy in common, particularly because both involve ascertained or separated shares. The distinction is critical: in tenancy in common, each co-owner holds an undivided fractional interest in the whole property — no one co-owner has an exclusive right to any physical portion. In severalty, there is no co-ownership at all. One person holds the entire interest to the exclusion of everyone else. The confusion is compounded in sources discussing partition, because when a tenancy in common or coparcenary is partitioned, each party receives a share "in severalty" — meaning the act of partition converts shared ownership into individual ownership. The term appears in both contexts but carries the same meaning throughout: sole, exclusive holding.
Recognized Forms
/SUBTYPES
Shifting severalties: A recognized historical form in which multiple owners of land have exclusive shares allotted to each in rotation or by some alternating arrangement, so that at any given time each person's share is separately ascertainable and exclusive, but the specific parcels or portions shift among them according to a governing rule or custom. This form was especially associated with common meadow lands in England, where strips or portions were allocated to individual holders for defined seasons, then reallocated. The term appears in Rapalje & Lawrence and reflects a practical English agrarian arrangement that does not map cleanly onto modern American property categories.
Why It Matters in Research
Severalty is a relational concept — it means almost nothing without the co-ownership alternatives against which it is defined. When you encounter it in historical sources, your first task is to identify what form of shared ownership it is being distinguished from, because that context tells you what legal problem the document is actually addressing.
The term appears in three distinct research contexts, each with different stakes:
First, as a baseline descriptor of individual ownership. In this use, it is often unremarkable — background language in a deed, treatise, or pleading establishing that no co-ownership complicates the analysis.
Second, as the outcome of partition. When a co-tenancy or coparcenary is divided, the resulting individual interests are said to be held "in severalty." Historical sources discussing partition actions or enclosure proceedings will use the term in this transitional sense. Researchers in English agrarian history or early American land division will encounter this usage frequently, especially in the context of common fields and meadows.
Third, in the specific context of shifting severalties and common land arrangements. This is the usage most likely to appear in English manor records, copyhold documentation, and enclosure history, and it is the usage least likely to be intuitive to researchers trained in modern American property law.
Watch for the phrase "in severalty" modifying a verdict, judgment, or liability. When a court enters judgment against defendants "in severalty," it means each defendant is individually and separately liable, not jointly — a procedural and remedial distinction with significant practical consequences in historical debt and tort litigation.
The historical American Indian land allotment context also uses this term: the Dawes Act of 1887 converted communally held tribal lands to individual allotments held "in severalty." Researchers working in federal Indian law or late nineteenth-century land history will encounter this usage extensively.
Historical Dictionary Support
Black's (1st Ed.) and Burrill's both lead with identical language drawn from Blackstone: "A state of separation. An estate in severalty is one that is held by a person in his own right only, without any other person being joined or connected with him, in point of interest, during his estate therein." This near-verbatim alignment reflects the term's stable doctrinal core — the concept did not evolve significantly between Blackstone and the late nineteenth century compilation of these dictionaries. Both correctly point to 2 Blackstone's Commentaries 179 as the locus classicus.
Rapalje & Lawrence adds practical dimension, specifically noting the contrast with joint ownership, tenancy in common, and coparcenary, and introducing the shifting severalties subtype. This is the most research-useful of the historical entries because it connects the abstract principle to the specific legal forms a researcher will encounter in primary sources.
The second edition Black's entry retrieved in the source material is misaligned — it appears to address settlement and administration of estates, not severalty. This is almost certainly a database retrieval artifact. Researchers should not rely on it for this term.
None of the historical dictionaries address the Dawes Act usage or the American Indian allotment context, reflecting the blind spots of general legal dictionaries compiled primarily from English common law sources.
Jurisdictional Note
The concept of severalty is consistent across common law jurisdictions, but its practical significance varies. In American Indian law, "allotment in severalty" carries a specific federal statutory meaning tied to the Dawes Act and its successor legislation, distinct from general property law usage. English sources addressing common fields, strips, and shifting severalties describe arrangements with no direct American equivalent.
Encyclopedia Cross-Reference
See Law Mind Encyclopedia: Co-Ownership and Concurrent Estates; Partition; Common Fields and Enclosure